


don't you wanna know if it's gonna go somewhere?

by atlantisairlock



Category: Ocean's 8 (2018)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst with a Happy Ending, Casual Sex, Endgame, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Future Fic, Happy Ending, Idiots in Love, Implied Sexual Content, Jealousy, Love Confessions, Making Out, Near Future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 01:46:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14945315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlantisairlock/pseuds/atlantisairlock
Summary: It's not that Lou's jealous. That's - stupid, she's not, she's not that much of a dumbass, not that much of a pathetic loser, she's not.Spoiler alert: Lou is very jealous.





	don't you wanna know if it's gonna go somewhere?

**Author's Note:**

> prompt from a guest: 'i would love some jealous!lou in any context you prefer since you're taking requests, that beach scene was lou in a fit of jealousy and nothing will change my opinion on that'. SO TRUE! 
> 
> title from 'start something' by lostboycrow.

It doesn't really dawn on Lou until about a month after the Toussaint heist when they're throwing Constance a congratulatory party for hitting a million followers on her YouTube account. It's two in the morning and they're all drunk and high and sprawled out around the living room in various contortions, playing a game of Spin the Bottle like teenagers. They're on their third round - so far, Constance has spun on Daphne, Daphne's spun on Nine Ball, and after a frankly obscene minute of making out, Nine Ball's finally reaching for the bottle and giving it a spin. It seems to be going really, really slow to Lou's addled brain, and she watches it as it comes to a stop. 

In front of Debbie. 

Debbie laughs throatily when she sees it, this grin spreading across her face, pleased and sly and a little dark, and Lou's brain is suddenly completely clear. She can hear her heart hammering as Debbie beckons Nine Ball closer and Nine Ball gamely goes, practically crawling across the tile to where Debbie's reclining on the beanbag and pulling herself up so she's resting right on top of Debbie. Debbie's legs are spread, just a little, making space for Nine Ball between them, and they make out, lazy, unhurried, wet and slick and unashamed. Amita pumps one fist and manages to cheer a little past the dizzy drunkenness, and the others chuckle a bit, but Lou's fists are clenched so tight her knuckles are going white. 

They're still kissing when she leaves, abrupt and quick, locking herself in her room for the rest of the day. 

 

 

It's not that she's jealous. That's - stupid, she's  _not,_ she's not that much of a dumbass, not that much of a pathetic loser, she's not. Even though she can't even  _look_ at Nine Ball for a week after that. Even though the anger eats at her for far longer than that, rising up in her throat and burning her tongue whenever she thinks about that night. It brings back terrible memories from before Debbie went to prison, from when Claude first entered their lives - hating Claude beyond all rational thought from the beginning, even before she started smelling a rat. Going out every night to find a girl to fuck when Debbie started dating him and scaring some of them off from how violent and desperate she was in bed. And from even  _before_ that. All the way to the start, when the two of them were a lot younger, a lot more reckless, a lot less smart. She remembers the week they spent in Vegas, lost in this haze of booze and drugs and thumping music in the clubs, when Lou would start fights with anyone who even looked at Debbie the wrong way. 

They aren't good memories. 

She thought she moved past this, when Debbie went to jail, when she got out. They've been partners for more than half Lou's life, working seamlessly, watching each other's sixes, and she hates that this might be happening again. Hates that she doesn't even have a name for it. 

She tries to kid herself that it'll be fine. That Spin the Bottle was a one-off thing, and it's not like Debbie's twenty again and going out every night to hook up with yet another beautiful woman in the club, right? It's different, now. It's Debbie and Lou and the six girls against the world, like it should be.

Even if she still wonders about Nine Ball, sometimes. Even if she thinks back on Amita and Tammy, back when they were helping Debbie on and off with other cons. She wonders, and she can't stop, and it fucking sucks.

 

 

She asks, because she's really good at messing herself up and breaking her own heart and other stupid shit like that. Amita's busy taking apart one of the necklaces from the heist and Tammy's working out some details regarding fencing another, and they're alone in the house, so Lou asks. "Hey, just wondering, like - in all the cons you've done with Debbie, all the time you spent together, all those years before this... did you guys ever...?"

"Weird question and weird timing," Amita says, not looking up from her work. "But yeah, I did, once or twice. If you mean fucking, as I think you mean, and not dating, we never dated. Don't know about Tammy, though."

Tammy, who is more cautious and has known Lou for longer than Amita has and who Lou suspects might know more about her than Lou knows about herself, looks up with a searching glance, and speaks slower, more thoughtful. "Why do you ask?"

"Just curious," Lou says, trying to hide the way she's digging her nails into her palm so hard she thinks she might be drawing blood. She feels a little light-headed, and Tammy's face seems to be swimming in front of her as she tilts her head slightly, still not breaking eye contact with Lou. "I dated Debbie for a while," she says, soft and still curious. "A couple of months, when we were a lot younger. But it didn't last. We were younger then. We wanted different things." 

It's weird how much Lou's chest is aching, how fast her heart is beating, and she realises belatedly that her mouth is wet and tastes of iron from how hard she's biting her lip. Tammy is still giving her that weird look, like she's seeing something Lou can't. "Lou," she says, but Lou's already turning on her heel and leaving, trying to figure out why her vision is so fucking blurry all of a sudden. 

 

 

_We were younger then._

But Lou was younger once, too, and it makes her wonder.

_We were younger then._

But they're older now, so what's changed?

What's changed?

_We were younger then._

They're older now, and Lou leaves her room one morning only to bump into Constance leaving  _Debbie's_ room, her hair messy and clothes disheveled but still looking bright-eyed, and suddenly Lou can't breathe. She stops dead, and Constance runs right into her, but she doesn't even feel it. Constance yelps in pain, rubbing her shoulder, then smiles abashedly up at Lou. "Sorry, Lou, didn't see you there."

She skips back off to her own room, leaving Lou standing there for a good five minutes, trying to swallow past the stone settling in her throat, trying to figure out how to move again, how to move past this.

 

 

It's not just Constance, which Lou learns the hard way, because she sees Rose, after, and Nine Ball, and there's a night she and Tammy come home from fencing another batch of jewels to find Daphne shoved up against the dining room wall with Debbie's mouth all over her neck, Daphne making these sweet needy noises that pierce Lou to the bone. 

Tammy clears her throat pointedly, and they both look up. Daphne makes an effort to blush and straighten up and pull away, wiping her mouth and scurrying off pretending like nothing happened, but Debbie doesn't. Debbie's always been proud, always been sure of herself, and she just meets Tammy and Lou's eyes with a brief shrug and small smile. "Sorry. Too public?" 

Lou thinks she makes an awful, broken noise in her throat, her stomach dropping and this weird mix of rage and jealousy and pure, unadulterated pain roiling inside her chest, and she can't speak, she can't see, just pushes past Debbie and Tammy to her room, curling up on her bed and not moving for the next six hours.

 

 

Debbie doesn't apologise and Lou doesn't expect her to, or want her to. Apologise for what? Debbie hasn't done anything wrong. She's free to fuck whoever she wants and she always has been and it is none of Lou's fucking business and Lou knows it, she  _knows_ - 

but it hurts every time she thinks about it, she hurts, can't even begin to describe it, doesn't have the words for it, the pain, because it's everyone. Debbie kissing Nine Ball, kissing Daphne, sleeping with Amita and Rose and Constance and Nine Ball, having  _dated_ Tammy,  _we were younger then,_ but this is now, and Lou can't help but look around at all of them. All seven of them, Debbie's girls, Ocean's Eight. 

Every time she looks at Debbie now, there's just one question in her head, one burning question, she just wants to know that one thing. Why all of them, but not her. 

_Why all of them?_

_Why everyone else?_

_Why not me?_

 

 

A year after they successfully steal hundreds of millions worth of jewels from the Met Gala, Lou gets stone fucking drunk. The house is empty but for her and Debbie - Tammy's gone to Disney World with her kids, Constance is at a skate competition, Amita and Nine Ball are both visiting their sisters, Rose is preparing for a show and Daphne's on location, and they've all left Lou alone with Debbie, and she's fucking done. She's done with hurting, and wondering, and agonising, and she stumbles into Debbie's room and pretty much falls flat on the floor. 

"Fuck, Lou, are you okay?" Debbie leaps off her bed and goes over to help her up, and Lou quite nearly punches her. "Don't you fucking even touch me," she slurs, jabbing ineffectually at Debbie's arm, and Debbie stops, backs off. Lou manages to pull herself up into a sitting position, glaring at Debbie. "Fuck you, Debbie Ocean, you fucking - after all this time, after everything, why am I still not good enough for you? Why have I never been good enough for you?"

Debbie - Debbie has the  _god damn nerve_ to be looking at Lou like she doesn't understand. "Lou, what are you talking about?"

"What am I - don't give me that shit, fuck you," Lou yells. "You can date Tammy and make out with Daphne and fuck Constance and  _all of them_ but not me? What is it about me, huh? Fucking answer that, Debbie, fucking tell me." Her face is warm and a bit wet and she realises with muted horror that she might be crying, ugh, she did not plan on that. This is gross, and it's getting worse because her voice is turning into this pathetic cross between a sob and whine. "Why don't you want me? I've wanted you for years, why am I not good enough, why don't you want me too?"

For the longest minute in Lou's life, the room is silent but for her choked, erratic sobbing and Debbie's breathing, before Debbie drops to her knees beside Lou and buries her face in Lou's shoulder. "Lou, don't be stupid."

What in the fuck?! All the sadness Lou's feeling is immediately pushed aside in favour of all-consuming fury. She shoves Debbie so hard that Debbie actually falls over onto the floor. "What the fuck, Deborah Ocean?" She can't breathe for how angry she is. "Don't be stupid - don't be - fuck you, Debbie, go fuck yourself, fuck you. You don't be stupid, you fucking asshole. How dare you even - "

"Jesus, Lou, I couldn't, okay?" Debbie raises her voice, and Lou falls suddenly silent. "You've always been too good for me and I  _couldn't._ I couldn't. Jesus." 

And then it's quiet. Lou's quiet, Debbie's quiet, no, she's crying too, putting her head between her knees and Lou is suddenly tired, so, so tired. 

It feels like  _hours_ later that Amita comes home and finds them both on the floor. "What the fuck?" Lou distantly hears her say, followed by a sigh, and then someone's pulling her up by the arms. "Okay, you're going to sleep. Debbie, you stay there, and I'll be back. God." 

Lou lets Amita drag her to her room and into her bed with no protest, just lies there and stares at nothing until she eventually falls asleep.

 

 

When she next wakes up, the sunlight is streaming through her window and she's immediately aware of another presence in the room. She's reaching for her knife and taser before she turns and realises it's Debbie, curled up in a chair next to her bed, dozing quietly. 

"Debbie?" It slips out of her mouth before she can stop herself, and Debbie jerks awake instantly, like she was waiting. Her eyes are a little wild and the less said about her hair and clothes, the better, but the moment she sets eyes on Lou, everything seems to soften. "Lou. You're awake."

"What are you doing in my room?" 

Debbie takes a breath, and it sounds so laboured, and Lou notices, even past the sleepy daze, that her eyes are red from crying. "Waiting for you to wake up, so we could talk. So I could - " She breaks off, sounding choked. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for - everything. I just didn't know how to deal with this." 

And Lou feels like there's an elephant sitting on her chest, isn't sure if it's hope or pain restricting her breathing, but she listens. Listens as Debbie speaks. "I didn't know how to even start, with you. I always thought there was something, from the start, but then they threw me into prison for five years and I was sitting in there all alone with no visitation rights, no letters, nothing, and I knew." 

"Knew what?" Lou asks, pushing past aforementioned elephant on chest, because she has to hear it, she has to  _know_ -

Debbie meets her eyes, years of regret and longing evident in her gaze. "I knew I was in love with you. I knew, and I always knew, and I was going to tell you when I got out, and then I got out. I saw you, and it just hit me how much you've lost because of me, Lou. How much you've had to sacrifice, and how long you've been waiting, and everything you had to give up because of me, and I couldn't do it. I couldn't look you in the eye and demand even more." She takes a deep breath. "I love the other girls, but not like this. I love them, but if push truly, truly came to shove, if I had no other choice, I could bear letting them go. But not you, Lou. I could never let you go." 

And in that second, everything lifts. It's like she was stumbling around in the dark, looking for the light switch, and suddenly the room is bathed with sun. Lou's laughing before she even knows it, lunging across the room to kiss Debbie, and she isn't even surprised that their mouths slide together to fit perfectly, like they were always meant to. She feels Debbie exhale into the kiss, relieved and aching and in love. 

"You're an idiot," Lou informs her when they finally feel like they can talk again. "But you're my idiot." 

Debbie ducks her head, smiles, presses her forehead against Lou's. Lou breathes in, breathes out, her hands settling on Debbie's waist. "My thief."

"My knight," Debbie replies, and kisses her again.

**Author's Note:**

> i have a jealous!debbie fic request + a multi-chapter debbielou request (this is probably going to be a dark!au or a undercover cop!au but we'll see). still open for any o8 requests!


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